Report: Santa Clara, Philadelphia finalists to host WrestleMania 31

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SANTA CLARA — Fresh off scoring the Super Bowl, the Bay Area now stands a good chance of landing wrestling’s big-money main event: WrestleMania.

Santa Clara is a finalist — competing with Philadelphia — to host the spring 2015 showcase of folding-chair smacks and body slams at the San Francisco 49ers’ new stadium.

Mayor Jamie Matthews and 49ers executives are flying to World Wrestling Entertainment headquarters in Connecticut to pitch the company’s charismatic chairman, Vince McMahon, next week. Two weeks ago, city leaders and 49ers CEO Jed York blitzed WWE officials with a presentation at Niners headquarters, emphasizing the stadium’s technology and size.

“It really is the wrestling world’s Super Bowl,” a confident Matthews said Tuesday. Like the NFL championship game, the first WrestleMania ever in Northern California would “be something that will benefit the cities around us economically and cement our preeminence as a sports capital here.”

WrestleMania 31 — which would also include a week of wrestling events — would no doubt take a pummeling in a hype match against the 50th Super Bowl, which Levi’s Stadium will host in February 2016.